A forum for discussing the Palestinian/Israeli peace process to learn what each side thinks and why; and for broader news about peace all over the Middle East.

This forum is heavily moderated by people who support both the Israeli and Palestinian positions. The goal is to have an honest and hate-free environment to discuss problems, solutions, and to try to bring people together in a common understanding.

Guidelines:

Be polite - Disagreements are fine ... but we want to keep this discussion civil

Be open minded - We are here to learn from one another and foster understanding. Try to see where the other person is coming from even if you don't agree with them.

Keep your submissions on topic

New Posting Guidelines

What is good: Anything that fosters discussion and can help people to see a different perspective.

What is bad: Clearly one-sided stories that are more about accusations rather than openness and understanding. Think about it this way ... if your article serves to primarily make one group or another look bad ... it will be removed.

Middle ground: If you feel that you can add to the discussion with an article that fits the "bad" category; submit it as text with an explanation and the link in your description.

I don't particularly support either. (and I don't consider myself an atheist, more that hipstery agnostic view).

My view is that the Israelis were given stolen land to occupy by the British and French. This pissed of a lot of Arabs. Time has gone on, and it is time for the Arabs to let go and accept their new neighbors. I allso think Israel is completely butchering any chance they have at attaining some sort of piece by continuing to swing their US funded balls around.

We don't hear the Turks still reeling at the thought of losing control of Syria after the fall of the Ottoman empire. There aren't terrorist groups springing up in England after losing the American colonies. And I sure has heck can't find the boundaries of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Syria, Lebanon, etc. on a map from prior to the 19th century.

Obviously the West has shaped the Arab world both geographically and culturally. They are angry about it. They are bitter, and Israel is a constant, glaring reminder. To accept Israel is to accept concession of Europes meddling.

I think both sides have a valid argument. I don't think any of this justifies the loss of one life. I don't think Israel is more right or Palestine is more right in their intentions. I don't think Palestinians are Terrorists or Israel are Freedom Fighters. They are two neighboring tribes who got jammed together thanks to Europe and have been unable to concede for fear of loss.

My view is that the Israelis were given stolen land to occupy by the British and French. This pissed of a lot of Arabs.

That's the Arab version. The Jewish version is that Jews returned to what was naturally, rightfully and legally their land, and that the 'pissed off' part came off as a product of Arab racism and Arab countries' desire to take over Palestine and incorporate it into their own domains, as nobody at the time made any contemplation of an independent Arab Palestine or the existence of a Palestinian national identity, both ideas were completely preposterous and rejected wholly both by the Arabs themselves and the international community at large.

The Jewish version is that Jews returned to what was naturally, rightfully and legally their land

How can it be theirs legally when they only owned less than 10% of the mandate, yet allotted +50% in the partition plan. Only in the twisted minds of early Zionists did Palestine "naturally and rightfully" belong to them.

The inhabitants of the Palestine had a right to exist in a state, or entity, that is cohesive with their established cultural and historical ties to the region. Being forced to become citizens of a concocted European nation is not only unfair, but a travesty. The state of Israel as partitioned by the UN would have had 50% of its population be Arabs. A preposterous plan that was rightly rejected.

Interesting view. I've never heard that take on it before. I, like most, usually hear a one sides argument. But this is, not obscure, but a new take in my point of view.
Quick question,What are you referring to when you say "swinging their balls around"

Swinging their big balls: Israel was formed due to the powerful Zionist lobby in England around the time of the Arab/Turk revolutions. They were able to gain support of Europe at the time and secure land in the Middle East for their country. Ever since they have been utilizing powerful diplomatic, economic, military, and social ties to counter the large Arab dissent towards their statehood.

Yes. But I mean you could say that for many countries. India, most of the Middle East (there's some French and Italian fault there too), American Indians, South America (with a hefty blame to the Spanish as well), SE Asia, etc...

The effects of Colonialism are still reverberating strongly. Despite the percieved grievances of many people (such as religion, culture, race, heritage, etc), it all stems from the after effects of Colonialism.

I know it's dismissive to say "lets forget the past and move on" but I don't see any way of rectifying the problem without doing that. We can sit here and not play ball, use isolationism and "let the arab world come up with an arab solution", but the reality is that they are so caught up in the identity struggle of who they are, who they have been for the past two centuries, and how the modern world sees them, that they can't escape the "Westernized" country labels and return to what would be an ideal arab solution: a region bound together under a unified nation by Islam, working to progress the Arabs to the self perceived glory they feel they were once at (12th century progressive era)

"Ansigt" and "gabpac" got it right. First off, fuck everybody who treats it like a sports game where you cheer for one team and boo the other. We're talking about people's lives here, not some dick-waving contest.

After living in Israel for over a year (and spending some time in the West Bank) beginning as a pretty uninformed and unbiased person, I inevitably have more sympathy for the Palestinian situation, simply because they suffer more and have absolutely no way to change their situation. There's no way to deny that, whether you quantify it in body count or in quality of life or in horrible things one side has done to the other. But I don't like saying I'm "pro-Palestinian" because that might make people confuse me with the dipshits who go over to volunteer in the West Bank for a month and come back ranting about how evil the Zionists are, and meanwhile they don't know shit about Israel except the bad things. It's like some European going on about how evil and terrible Americans are, like Bush and the Iraq war are representative of the entire population of millions of people.

Both sides are pretty much made of up regular people, not orcs or some other evil caricature. And I've made good friends in most of the demographics you find there - secular, conservative religious, various ethnic minorities, various political views.

But there's another way of oversimplifying things other than "one side is good, the other is bad." And that is "both sides are mostly good people, but there are a few bad apples that ruin everything." No, bullshit.

The thing is that regular people have a tremendous capacity for evil. The same people that are so friendly and hospitable and talk about how they want peace, may well be screaming for blood after the latest airstrike or rocket attack, because basically humans are scum in a lot of ways. You can't ignore that the same regular Joe, basically good people, Palestinians you meet also tend to teach their kids ridiculously hateful things about Jews, or that those prickly-on-the-outside-sweet-on-the-inside Israelis have voted in every single election for pro-occupation, pro-apartheid, anti-peace governments, or that a majority of young people in Israel are anti-democracy and racist in every poll that asks about their attitudes.

So what the fuck? Sometimes you just want to say screw it, they deserve each other. But if you love the place enough to spend a lot of time in it, you can't ever really resign yourself to that.

When it comes to history, obviously there's plenty of blame to go around, but the thing about history is nobody really gives a shit about it. They just want to believe some version of events that makes their side look good. Lots of Israelis and their supporters have no clue about the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians that took place in and after 1948, and so as far as they know the Palestinian refugee movement is just a bunch of evil orcs clamoring to destroy them because they hate Jews - when you take the history out of the picture, people's actions stop making sense, and it's that much easier to explain them as the result of people just being evil.

But I don't think educating people on history is the answer either; people are too intent to ignore things they don't want to hear. Personally, I think the only hope, however slight, for any kind of peaceful resolution, has to come from outside - forced down everyone's throat by the UN or the US or international sanctions. Kind of like how whites and blacks in the 1950s south would never have worked out some kind of negotiated deal to end segregation; LBJ had to send in the fucking national guard.

The peace process is a joke; Palestinians all know this and so do many Israelis, though the right-wing government keeps using them as an excuse to do nothing. The sooner everyone realizes what a farce these are, the better. And because Israel holds all the power in the situation, it's on them to take unilateral steps to resolve things - withdraw from the West Bank, dismantle settlements, allow the Palestinians there to have freedom - because with such a power imbalance where the powerful side has an interest in the status quo, this can never be negotiated. And if this has to be forced on them by the international community, so be it.

But I'm not optimistic. I don't think there's going to be any peaceful (i.e. peaceful and just) resolution to this, ever.

So...I guess that was pretty rambly. But there you have it - it's complicated and can't be boiled down to good guys and bad guys, even if you put even numbers of both on both sides of the conflict.

You wont get a non-biased opinion just because people don't have a religious interest in the matter.

I'm not religious in any way and my sympathy lies primarily with the Palestinians. Primarily. That means I don't just blindly choose a side, but actually try to understand the different viewpoints of either side.

I recently lived in Jerusalem and worked in the West Bank for some time. Before that I think I was pretty undecided in the conflict, but living there and seeing how every day Palestinian life is influenced so greatly by the occupation shifted my attitude. I could go on and on about measures and particular things that the Israeli states have put in place (settlements, separate law systems, separate road systems, general harassment, humiliation, racism, etc. etc.) to keep the Palestinians down, but I will just say that when combining these things, there is no doubt what's going on. Israel is deliberately keeping the Palestinian existence to a minimum. Both through economy, law, military, commerce, and everyday life.

I became friends with both Arabs and Jews while staying there.

Now the situation is complex and you cannot split it up into black and white or good vs. evil like many people think you can. Israel has its reasons too and the Israeli public opinion towards the Palestinians is not something created out of the blue. The conflict goes both ways, but Israel has the upper hand by far and thus I also believe they have a greater responsibility in solving it too.

I support Israel, because I think the best chance for peace is if Israel annexes the territories of Gaza, the West Bank, and Golan Heights. Will it be bloody and ruthless? Yes, but I think that for long-term peace, it is the only way. The Palestinians would lose their homeland, unfortunately, but history is full of examples of conquest so just because we live in some modern era doesn't mean we are beyond this kind of behavior. It would take the IDF a few years to invade the territory, destroy all resistance, and expel any lingering threats, then a few more years to defend itself from the rest of the Arab world, but in the end, the equilibrium will be more stable. Is it worth it?

At this point, I don't believe that either has the moral high ground. I think the continued building of Israeli settlements in the West Bank is utterly wrong and that Israeli policy often seems aimed at keeping the Palestinians from moving in a viable direction. I think the hardships faced by Palestinians encourages radicalization to some degree. But I totally abhor Hamas's willingness to use violence on civilians now and the suicide bombings of the 2nd Intifada were completely unjustifiable.

They're locked in a vicious cycle of being terrible to each other. Any move either side makes is met with retaliation, which triggers a new round. At this point, how it started is almost irrelevant in my mind - most of the people fighting today's battles weren't born yet. They're in a terrible situation and European colonialism had a lot to do with how things got set up.

Edit:
The religious aspect to all of it just pisses me off more. I don't think it's right to have a nation founded on a particular religious identity as it leads to inherent inequalities. Any eventual solution will have to involve mutual respect of religious differences and bilateral recognition of the right to exist. I want whatever solution will lead to maximal justice and liberty with minimal bloodshed.